In Wallace Steven's article, “Art, Entertain, Entropy”, he discusses how commercial entertainment is not art. He describes how we now have a conditioned response while viewing commercial entertainment, which is not an active process. His critique is essentially that art creates us to “really” think, and is active, while commercial entertainment can be watched without any energy, mentally or physically.
With new forms of entertainment media such as Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, etc. they allow us to actually engage and have an interactive experience as a user. For example Facebook allows us to not only choose who we want to be friends with, view what they are doing, but also physically chat with someone as well. These sites allow for our own personal character to shine through, and put “energy” behind our blogs, Youtube videos etc. Steven in his article states, “ Useful information accelerates change. Redundant information restricts change”, with these sites and the internet the information is ever changing. For example on Facebook someone could “update” their status endless amounts in a day creating the information they are presenting never to be the same; everyone is sharing new news all of the time, which essentially brings on change. On Youtube, users take time, and actively videotape themselves doing things that they believe the world should see. These sites create a common ground for people all over the world to share new ideas, give feedback, and actively exchange ideas with one another. This new form of interactive media allows users to not be like commercial entertainment creators, but be more like artists, with creating and sharing new ideas with people around the world.
I find this to be an interesting argument, stating that sites such as face book and youtube are mediums of creation, and are means for which individuals can exchange ideas with others. Yet, I cannot help but ask if these sites are double-edged swords, in that they also propitiate the redundancy of media. For example, status updates often are innocuous statements involving daily life, rather, inundating viewers in sentences that do not hold much value (i.e. "I made a pie today" or "so and so is lame"). However, I think that your view of these social media sites is a direction that would very much benefit society, and promote change.
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